ADVOCATING for people and giving back to the community are two passions that inspired Steve Catania to run for the seat of Midland after Michelle Roberts decision to not contest this year’s March 8 election.
Some years ago his father started a travel business in Midland and the family lived in Guildford for years with the Labor candidate now living in Bassendean.
He is on the committee of the Swan View Agricultural Society and a member of the Guildford Association and Guildford Historical Society.
In his day job as a lawyer he has represented small businesses, workers and bigger companies.
“But certainly most recently I’ve focused on representing workers and occupational safety and dignity in the workplace and fighting for a fair day’s pay,’’ he said.
Some of his colleagues who are also legal practitioners keep their practicing certificate in a pro-bono capacity.
If he is successful in his bid to represent the Midland electorate he does not intend to follow suit.
“My intention is to be the member of Midland full time.’’
He is a long-term member of the Labor party – in the vicinity of 25 years.
“It is wonderful to have the opportunity to run.
“Growing up I learnt the value of hard work and service to the community from my father Nick.
“He instilled in us – my family and me – the values of equity and compassion and community and that’s why I became an advocate and that’s why I became a lawyer myself.
“It’s really about giving back to the community as much as possible.
“I’m really proud actually of what Labor governments have achieved in the area.
“The opportunity has arisen for me to put my hand up and be able to play my part in terms of service to the community so I’m really passionate about that because that’s the way we were brought up and so that is why I want to really reinvest as much as possible at a local level.”
If elected one of his strategies will be to invest in the local and grassroots level – community groups, sporting clubs, schools and the Swan View Agricultural Society, which puts on the Swan View show.
“Part of my election commitments are to invest in the agricultural society to be able to purchase equipment to be able to put on that historical show once again.’’
He said the skills he would bring to the role included advocating and getting across policies and issues.
“My whole working life I’ve been an advocate for people – that’s what I do on a daily basis.
“Also I have the capacity understand policy requirements both from a law and a legislative perspective.
“Part of being a lawyer is understanding issues and taking up those issues and fighting on behalf, in this case, for the community.
“I’ve been passionate about that my whole life.’’
When he’s been out doorknocking people have been concerned about the cost of living and access to healthcare.
Education is also another topic raised by people in the electorate.
He said in relation to health care there was a major election commitment on Monday, which if he was elected and the Cook government were re-elected would increase the capacity of beds in the emergency department for Midland Health Campus and create a mental health unit.
“This is different to what is currently being created at the Midland Health Campus through St John of God.
“There’s more work to do but it’s a really significant announcement.
“The total announcement is $140 million but the emergency department and outpatient is $104m with scoping starting next year so that’s really to address the emergency sector of that hospital, which is really positive.
“This will include the triage, greater access for ambulance services as well to reduce ramping so it’s going to be a really significant project.’’
He believes that in the area more broadly there is a fantastic opportunity to work with small business but also to be able to drive investment in the area – that can include creating further investment in the council particularly to create density including affordable housing initiatives such as the Tuohy Gardens project on the corner of Great Eastern Highway.
KALAMUNDA resident Lisa Logan is the Nationals’ candidate for the seat of Kalamunda and says she wants to help the community by correcting government overreach and being the area’s voice.
Mrs Logan has eight years of experience in the political landscape and previously managed a mixed cropping and sheep farm in the Wheatbelt before moving back to the hills.
She said she wasn’t a career politician and found herself drawn to the position through a combination of happenstance and a desire to help others.
“I didn’t seek out local government,” she said.
“At 18, I would have taken a job at the telecentre, but it just so happened that it was with the local shire,” she said.
“That then put me in touch with watching how the mechanisms of all of that works.
“I just learnt more about how important it is to get involved in these things, and how much I enjoyed it.”
Mrs Logan spent about 10 years in the Wheatbelt before moving back to the hills in 2015.
She said she loved the sense of pride residents had for the place they lived and that she hoped to protect it.
“We need to also then protect it for future generations and make sure that it is still a home in the hills and a home in the forest, and make sure that we do try and keep that unique sense of identity,” she said.
“That makes more people want to move here and when they do move here then they want more development and you’ve got to find the right balance.
“Everyone’s come out against the North Stoneville development.
“It doesn’t need 2000 houses when you could have five acres or two and a half-acre lots out there instead of 400sqm lots.
“We’re not against development but it’s about doing it sustainably and in the correct areas because one of the things that I find a lot out here is people want to stay and they’re ready to downsize but we don’t have that housing stock here.
“Developing in Kalamunda is difficult as we don’t have the sewage and the water systems in place.
“We’ve got a $1 billion headworks funds that we’ve announced because we shouldn’t have those barriers and we’ve got to be able to help industry.
“We need to get rid of those financial barriers so we can grow more business and grow more tourism and continue to have that local economy thriving.
“Nobody wants a main street with no shops in it.”
Mrs Logan said another area of focus was helping areas like Parkerville, Chidlow, Wooroloo and Beechina get better funding.
“They’re distinct, unique communities and they are effectively small towns.
“They’re a little bit closer to services, but they tend to be almost to the forgotten area because they are in what’s called the metro area, so they miss out on a lot of funding for things that are considered regional, but their needs are the same.
“There’s no different need to someone who lives in Wooroloo than to someone who lives 5km up the hill in Bakers Hill and yet there is distinct funding differences that they can tap into because they are regional.
“One of the things that I will be fighting for strongly here in Kalamunda is the idea of this regional boundary and how it doesn’t exist anymore because McGowan changed the legislation.
“There is no longer a metro city line in the sand and the creation of the federal seat of Bullwinkel shows that exactly because they have actually gone, ‘well, no, you can cross the border’.
“So then having discrete funds and what is defined as regional needs to be looked at – they’ve missed out on a lot of funding.”
Mrs Logan said she always wanted to stand up for people and using lending her voice to others was her way of doing it.
“This isn’t a flash in the pan idea for me – I wasn’t, you know, tapped on the shoulder or pulled in,” she said.
“This is my community where I live, and I will be back in four years’ time to try again because this is important to me that our community is well represented.”
CROOKED Spire owner and Swan Chamber of Commerce president Mike Matich is running as the Liberal candidate for the seat of Midland.
Mr Matich said he decided to run for the seat of Midland because he was frustrated and could hear the community’s frustration as well.
“I’m really lucky that, you know, I’ve got this business right here in the middle of town and it is a really central point,” he said.
“I get to hear from lots of different people from all walks of life.
“I think the frustration is like, it’s like Midland’s been forgotten.
“It’s been a safe Labor seat for 28 years.
“In that time, I would often hear people who have been around talking about this nostalgic Midland and what it used to be like.”
Mr Matich said when the Swan Chamber was looking at putting on a motor racing event in Midland, someone brought in photos from the mid-90s Gull Speed Classic events held in Midland.
“It’s a great event – you could see cars and all the places set up but behind that I saw all these shops and I saw the life that was there.
“That really resonated with me and it made me understand what I’d heard for these last 10 years being in Midland.
“And I do feel like Midland has been forgotten.”
Mr Matich said people in Perth didn’t give Midland the respect it deserved but it was an area with great things already and potential on top.
“But these things that have come have not been because of government input,” he said.
“It’s because private enterprise or individual people and families have put these things here and has made it great.
“So, I really want to represent Midland and see Midland thrive and come alive again.”
Mr Matich said some of the key issues he had heard about were cost of living, the traffic situation in Midland, and impact to businesses.
“We’ve got a cost-of-living crisis,” he said.
“People are really struggling, we’ve got a large homeless population in Midland.
“We’ve got local issues, issues across the state, and we need proper solutions to these problems.”
Mr Matich said it wasn’t his first choice to run and he was never political but he wanted to make a difference for Midland because the community had approached him for representation.
“I actually think Midland is one of the best places in our state, and I’ve put my business here, and we’ve turned a derelict building into a thriving community, and I think that’s really important,” he said.
“I’ve never been a member of a political party up until a month ago – if you asked me a year ago, I probably would have laughed at you.
“I had enough advice as well not to do this, saying that, ‘in your role as the chamber president, you’re apolitical’, which I always have been.
“I’ve been able to meet with Rita Safiotti and Michelle Roberts over time and work with these people because at the end of the day, I want what’s best for Midland.
“So, we’ve worked really hard at the Swan Chamber of Commerce over the last number of years to be apolitical.
“I’m assuming the next question from you is, well, how do you think the Swan Chamber of Commerce is apolitical when you are running as the member for Midland for a particular political party?
“The great thing is we’ve got our treasurer, Michelle Maynard, running (for Labor) in Swan Hills.
“We’ve actually got two of our board members who are both running for parliament.
“So, I think that’s really exciting and it just really shows the diversity that we’ve got in the chamber.
“This is me having a go and being a part of the system and trying to get in and make a change for Midland.”
LONG-TIME Midland resident Sarah Howlett is running as an independent candidate for the seat of Midland and says it’s time Midland’s traffic got the state government attention it deserved.
Ms Howlett has lived in Midland for 30 years and is serving her fourth year in the city as a councillor for the Midland Guildford ward.
As a professional, Ms Howlett has worked, owned businesses and volunteered thousands of hours to community service in Swan, including organising local events.
She has spent 25 years managing key hospitality venues in the Swan Valley and has recently moved into the glass industry.
Ms Howlett said she strongly believes the Midland electorate deserves better and has been let down by successive state governments.
“I am running because the seat of Midland is considered a safe Labor seat and it has been for the last 29 years under the same elected member,” she said.
“A safe seat attracts no attention, and it gets nothing.
“You need to be a swing seat or a marginal seat to get anything done.
“Our elected member has been Speaker of the House, a very important job 100 per cent but it’s a political party job.
“It’s not representative for the electorate.
“Prior to that, our elected member was the Minister of Police, another hugely important role.
“Again, where does that leave time for her to look after her electorate affairs and the people and their concerns?
“So my frustrations are born out of 29 to 30 years of seeing Midland stagnate.
“A lot of that I’ve come to learn is through decisions made by state government, made for us, not necessarily with us.”
Ms Howlett said she had been doorknocking since June to understand what residents’ concerns were and traffic became an issue repeated again and again.
She said the biggest problems were the road network infrastructure, and decisions around traffic infrastructure, which was causing business in Midland to die as people began shopping elsewhere.
“Even Guildford’s choosing to shop elsewhere,” Ms Howlett said.
“People won’t come into Midland because it’s just not accessible.
“None of these major state government decisions have been in the best interest of the businesses in Midland, which is leading to its demise.
“So that’s one of the spurs that has got me wanting to run.”
Ms Howlett, who has volunteered thousands of hours to community service, including organising local events, wants a ban on political-owned businesses.
Ms Howlett said she wanted to reform the planning system, which has taken powers away from the community and local governments.
Swan residents will have a chance to see Ms Howlett and talk to her about issues or meet her during her Meetings in the Park events.
SWAN Hills Labor candidate Michelle Maynard says coming from a working-class family and seeing the impacts policies had on her life was where her own interest in politics began.
Ms Maynard told Echo News she aims to carry on Swan Hills Labor member Jess Shaw’s spirit of advocacy, hard-work, and community presence if given the opportunity.
“I’m yet to have a meeting where I’m with Jess or we’re meeting with someone about this where I’m not told I have very big shoes to fill, or whoever has the role has very big shoes to fill,” she said.
“What a great bar to set for the community to measure their candidates against – we’ve had this level of representation for the past eight years and it’s wonderful for the Swan Hills community to have such great representation.
“That obviously comes from her being so approachable being such a part of that community that people feel like they can approach her with their problems because she’s visible and she’s genuine.
“Jess wasn’t one of those politicians that comes out one day every three and a half years to make sure people realise she’s around – she’s at the swap meets, she’s at the school events, and people know who she is and knows what she stands for and what she’ll do for them and I think that’s incredibly important when you’re a politician.
“Those are key things that I would like to emulate from what Jess has done and be a good honest hard-working local member that never takes for granted the faith people in the Swan Hills put in you to do the best you can for them.”
Ms Maynard is an Ellenbrook business owner and West Swan resident, and while she lives in the neighbouring electorate, she said her connections to the electorate she’s campaigning in are strong.
“I live one electorate over in West Swan, which is the one that abuts it, but because my business is in Ellenbrook, that’s my connection to the community,” she said.
“I’m the treasurer of the Ellenbrook Dockers, the Ellenbrook Community Collective and Swan Chamber of Commerce.
“So that’s my connection to the community so while I don’t live in there at the moment I am obviously connected – I’m not parachuted in from anywhere.”
Ms Maynard said reaching out to the community has been rewarding and she’s heard resident concerns about cost of living, accessible transport, the need for a public pool and community centre in Ellenbrook.
“Cost of living is a massive one,” she said.
“Being able to afford raising kids here, being able to have sports programs and being able to afford the mortgage and budgeting.
“With the train now open, people have been waiting for that for 20 years.
“So, big things like that and getting the services out there that people want is a goal of mine.”
Ms Maynard said she’s looking forward to impacting the community positively by delivering the same services that provided opportunities for her successes.
“I have always had an interest in politics more so from a perspective of realising from a very early age the people on TV had an impact on my life and so I always took an interest in what was going on because I feel like you have to,” she said.
“It’s your obligation and it’s your right as a voting citizen to know what’s going on.
“This is my opportunity to help protect those things for people like me who are just watching on TV like ages ago.
“While I’ve built an incredibly successful life for myself, that foundation, that core root is something that I hold onto a lot,” she said.
“I come from a single-parent household, my mom still works at Coles, we are here as a very grounded salt of the earth every day working Australian family.
“And while people might see a snippet of my life now, as an accounting partner, I’ve won some amazing awards which has been fantastic but that’s who I’ve become, but who I am at my core is an everyday salt of the earth working person.
“When I think about government, I think their core job is to provide those basic things for people to make sure they’re incredibly strong, so people like me have the chance to be successful.”
ROD Henderson, who is running for the seat of Swan Hills in the next state election, says it is an advantage that the incumbent Jessica Shaw is retiring but he still sees himself as the underdog.
A City of Swan councillor, Mr Henderson lost to Ms Shaw in the 2021 election and also unsuccessfully contested the seat of West Swan in 2017.
But he told Echo News he had decided to run again in what he said was a bellwether seat.
“I’m quite well known in the Swan Hills district – that’s an advantage, Jessica Shaw has decided to retire – that’s another plus and I can just see at the moment there’s a swing going on towards the Liberal Party,’’ he said.
“It’s one of those flip-flop seats – Frank Alban had it for two terms, Jess had it for two terms – it might be it comes to the Liberals again for two terms.
“Certainly the Liberal Party is going to see a swing back to it there’s no doubt about that.’’
The seat has undergone some redistribution to accommodate the high population growth in the neighbouring seat of West Swan, which involved transferring part of Ellenbrook from Swan Hills to West Swan with the more highly populated localities of Aveley and Belhus shifting to Swan Hills.
To maintain an elector population in Swan Hills that is at the lower end of the permitted range, the electoral commissioners also transferred a significant area of the Shire of Mundaring from the district of Swan Hills to the district of Kalamunda.
After the WA electoral redistribution was released ABC election analyst chief Antony Green said in 2021 Labor won 53 seats, the Liberals two and The Nationals three.
“On the old boundaries the Liberals and Nationals needed a uniform swing of 23.4 per cent to gain the 24 seats needed for government,’’ he said.
“The new boundaries do little to alter the swing needed.’’
Mr Henderson said the Liberals had good candidates out there for this election.
“Certainly if you look at the policy that we’re just starting to release now people can start to see what we’re about and what our candidates are (about),’’ he said.
When asked if any policy released to date was of particular interest to Swan Hills residents he said it was a broad spectrum.
“There’s some very obvious ones and that is the cost of living pressures (are) massive so we’ll be looking at measures to deal with cost of living pressures.
“But the other big one is the fact that our hospitals are struggling, ambulance ramping has been absolutely off the planet and of course the police are literally 800 understaffed.”
While very positive he agreed it was going to be difficult for him to win Swan Hills.
“I’m not saying that I have a margin that I’m going to win on.
“I’m saying I’m definitely the underdog so that in itself is the uphill battle for me.”
Just days before the Ellenbrook line opened he said Metronet was $10 billion over budget, which was going to hurt the state’s bottom line big time.
“So for my purpose with only 10 per cent of the population using rail we’ve got to say ‘Okay what are the key things that make our road networks work so infrastructure like bridges and overpasses and all that kind of thing’.
“Infrastructure is the one single thing that I believe has been neglected if you look at water works, sewerage works, all the electrical installations to be able to service urban development they are way behind the eight-ball and that’s something that needs to be fixed up or otherwise we won’t be able to build those houses.’
GUILDFORD resident and former Geraldton MLA Ian Blayney is spearheading the Nationals WA’s push into metropolitan seats for the first time in over a hundred years.
The Nationals WA leader Shane Love and Mr Blayney met with Echo News this week to speak about representing Forrestfield and he said the role meant quite a lot to him as it’s a first and a strategically strong move.
“You don’t get many opportunities in life to do something for the first time,” Mr Blayney said.
“I’m a member of Rotary and I’m a member of a church in Guildford, so there are a couple of interests I have in the community.
“I’ve run for seats in parliament four times and three times successfully.
“But this is very different because obviously I live near it and I’ve been living around here for four years, but it’s different to where it was in Geraldton.”
Mr Blayney said he had lived in Geraldton for most of his life and despite the differences, there were similarities between the two areas as well.
“Geraldton’s a service centre for the Midwest, which is predominantly mining now, and the similarity here is that a lot of people in Forrestfield are either involved in the mining industry as fly-in-fly-out workers, or they’re involved in the trucking industry, and there’s a lot of people here in the trucking industry and there’s a lot of people involved in the small business sector.”
“But I’ve been struck a little at the similarities of most of the area to some of the suburbs in Geraldton, in particular the suburb called Allendale in Geraldton.
“It reminds me a lot of Allendale, which has got a very similar sort of demographic with a lot of young families generally involved in either small business, mining or agriculture.”
He spent a lot of time dealing with housing and medical issues when representing the residents of the Geraldton electorate and wanted to bring his experience to Forrestfield.
Mr Love and Mr Blayney both wanted to be a voice for the firearm owners who were impacted by the latest round of legislation for reforms of the Firearms Act.
“I have an open-door policy: if you’ve got a problem, come and see me and I’ll do what I can to help you.
“I work hard and I’m not here for myself,” Mr Blayney said.
MUNDARING’s North Stoneville development lit a fire in the heart of Greens Kalamunda candidate Janelle Sewell as she says she feels the community voice wasn’t being heard.
“To have such a large-scale development like what is proposed by Satterley is irresponsible on a lot of levels,” Ms Sewell said.
“I’ve lived up in Perth Hills now for almost 25 years and I have not seen the escarpment looking ever like it’s looked now.
“Whistlepipe Gully, where I walked only last week, is pretty much dead and I actually cried because people who live in Perth Hills understand you actually get to know the trees in the area.
“You get to know the wildlife that visits them and to see them dead is kind of like losing part of your community.”
Ms Sewell said she wanted to run for the electorate of Kalamunda because the community deserved a voice.
“For me it’s actually been guided by the community and ensuring that our community have a voice because they don’t have that at the moment,” she said.
“Labor (says) to its members of parliament what their positions are and I believe that democracy needs to be enhanced by actually allowing there to be voices who are there for the people living in the area.
“That is what I hope to bring, and I hope to bring more environmentally responsible decisions for our community as well.
“We can have development but it’s about the way that it’s done — you can’t have an Ellenbrook style development which is essentially what North Stoneville is.
“It’s very similar to what may be appropriate for Ellenbrook now, but it’s certainly not appropriate for a community that has been ravaged by fire in the past.”
Ms Sewell said she felt her political career was over but her running for the electorate was an answer to a community cry for help.
“What was really surprising to me was I had no intention of running,” she said.
“I thought my political career was over, but I had some pretty highly prominent people approach me across the community and they asked me to run because they needed hope.
“They’ve seen my record when I was a councillor, they saw my record when I worked for the current member of Kalamunda.
“We can only no longer make decisions on a four yearly cycle, so I think I bring those values that people are looking for to the role.
“I’m prepared to fight and be courageous otherwise I wouldn’t be here.”
MUNDARING councillor Karen Beale wants to bring a focus on tourism, public education, and community outcomes to parliament as a hopeful representative of the Kalamunda electorate.
Ms Beale said a formal political education was not how she found herself engaged in government but rather it was a natural progression from engaging with community.
“I wasn’t a typical study politics kind of person and that’s not where I come from,” she said.
“If you would have said to me 10 years ago that I’d be running for parliament I would have laughed.”
Ms Beale said the experience of helping the community during times of need was what drove her to take part in government instead of her accountancy, which she had studied.
“Just the satisfaction you get from helping someone specially when they’re in a bad situation is really rewarding.
“In 2021, I ran for council because there was a decision made that I really didn’t like about the youth program.
“I thought, ‘Well, I can either complain about it or I can get back in and try and fix it,’ so that’s what I did.”
Ms Beale is the chair of the board for Swan View High School and said she saw the impact youth programs had.
“Swan View has a low socio-economic demographic, and a lot of kids with highly difficult circumstances at home,” she said.
“That youth program was helping a small amount of people but it made a big difference.
“I was really annoyed that it got cancelled, so one thing that I’ve been wanting to drive while I’ve been on council is to reinstate that, and thankfully we’re getting there.”
Ms Beale also said she hoped tourism is boosted in the Perth Hills.
“We’ve got the most beautiful place up here and there’s trails, wineries, cider houses, restaurants and we’re only 45 minutes from the CBD — why would you go to Margaret River when you can come up here?” she said.
“We’re the hills, and it’s the gateway to these great adventures and we’ve got to do a better job of marketing our thing which can create really good employment opportunities for younger people.
Ms Beale said she hopes to leave a lasting legacy in the community her family had been in for generations.
“If you can get in there and change something and be a part of the solution rather than part of the problem then you’re leaving the situation in a better place, aren’t you?”
LIBERAL candidate for Kalamunda Adam Hort is a sixth generation hills resident, state heart transplant pharmacist, and former deputy mayor of Gosnells who says he wants to make a difference.
Mr Hort met with Echo News this week to share his deep connections to the area and how his upbringing shaped who he is and why he got involved in government.
“(My ancestors) moved right across Australia in the 1800s and settled in Darlington right against what we would now call Great Eastern Highway,” he said.
“They lived in a cottage up against the highway called Hortly Lodge and that’s where my grandfather, pop I call him, was born.
“Now, I’m raising my kids who are seventh generation Perth Hills residents in Lesmurdie.”
Mr Hort said he attended school in the hills, doing well in chemistry and eventually working in pharmacy which helped set his course to become the state’s chief heart transplant pharmacist and regional health head pharmacist.
“Like any good high school kid, I worked at the local fish and chip shop and I delivered newspapers around Lesmurdie on my bike,” he said.
“I stacked shelves in Woolies but eventually I found myself working in Nightingales Pharmacy in Kalamunda.
“That’s where I really got to know my community and really relished that community connection.
“I’d see grandparents, parents and their kids coming through for a variety of different ailments and needing different things and I got to help them, and I loved it.”
Mr Hort carried his community ideals with him to Thornlie where he lived for a while before moving back to the hills.
During that time the Thornlie community urged him to run for council which was his first taste of working in government.
Mr Hort said this led to a successful run as an elected member, and later became the deputy mayor of Gosnells, where he got to familiarise himself with local government and state government’s relationship.
He said with the inside perspective, he realised how little power local government had and how much constraint was put on local government by state government and so wanted to change tack.
Mr Hort said the road ahead meant many meetings with the community, and hoped people would be comfortable approaching him for a pub or coffee catch-up to discuss what they cared about.
“A lot of people are concerned about bushfires and what’s happening with bushfires and whether or not their local bushfire brigade is going to be resourced appropriately as well as the issue of housing affordability,” he said.
“I’m genuinely doing this because I want to make a difference, and I think any other option in this election will not generate the outcomes that our community deserves.”
LIBERAL’s endorsed candidate for Bullwinkel Matt Moran says he is ready to serve the community he was born and raised in and wants to meet as many people as possible.
“I was born in Kalamunda, I grew up in Boya, went to primary school in Greenmount, and I had my first job as a kitchen hand at Dragon Village not far from Midland, and my family has been involved in the area for generations,” he said.
“My grandfather was the shire clerk of Kalamunda, and my grandparents had a small chicken farm in Mundaring.
“My parents had a small farm in Toodyay and dad still lives in Toodyay and mum’s in Northam.”
Mr Moran met with Echo News last week to share his hopes of carrying his community’s concerns to Canberra, and to help formulate “pragmatic solutions”.
“The key is to listen to what people are concerned about and make sure those concerns are heard in Canberra and that you actually come up with pragmatic solutions that help people,” Mr Moran said.
“Pragmatic solutions are for example, we have an issue with housing supply, and the way you deal with that is by increasing housing supply.
“It’s supply and demand - when you don’t have much supply and there’s a high demand, prices go up.
“One of the best things I ever did was buy a small townhouse in my early twenties.
“That was a great decision, and I really hope that young people have that same opportunity, and that’s something we can hopefully help them achieve by increasing housing supply.”
Mr Moran has a background in the defence force, having been deployed in Afghanistan and East Timor as a public affairs officer, and serving alongside Liberal Canning MHR Andrew Hastie.
He said it instilled a sense of service and discipline, which meant meeting with community members and councils to hear out their concerns.
“It’s about serving community,” he said.
“For me it’s about listening to concerns, it’s about helping the community and it’s that devotion to the nation and that sense of service that I developed through my military service.
“That’s what drives me — it’s that sense of service that you can make a difference.”
In the previous week, Mr Moran said his team had put in requests to meet the councils, and because of the recency of his endorsement, he was eager to formally talk as soon as possible.
Mr Moran confirmed he met with the Shire of Mundaring and the City of Kalamunda on Monday to have a formal chat about bringing their aspirations to a federal stage.
He said it was a huge honour to be the Liberal candidate and invited community members to approach him and strike up a conversation.
“The key is to meet as many people as possible,” he said.
“Meet the local cities, meet the local shires, go to the local markets, be available and be really visible.
“If anyone wants to come and have a chat with me, please come up and have a talk.”
MUNDARING deputy president Trish Cook has been chosen to be Labor’s candidate for the new federal seat of Bullwinkel and says her experience in collaboration will be her greatest strength for delivering the community’s requests.
Ms Cook pointed to her four years off council as an example of her ability to mobilise people and help them achieve what they want through collaborative work.
“In my four years off I (learned) what people wanted, and I knew how things worked, and I got involved in the community,” she said.
“I chaired a group called Darlington Community Recreation Advisory Group.
“We had this huge, big area in the main centre of the Darlington Village.
“As chair of this group, I got together and I did a year-long community consultation with my local community all the groups, all the residents nearby, including the fire brigade who are based there, and said, ‘What do you want for this area?’
“‘We can’t leave it like this — it’s just barren and looks like a disused mine site.’
“The shire at that time was saying they had no money, so in Darlington we just go up and do it ourselves, and that’s what I did.”
Ms Cook said she utilised the abundance of retired professionals in her area and secured a local architect to turn the local community vision into a plan.
“We had a plan, we had agreement, and all we needed now was money,” she said.
“It was election time, and we backed both horses, and Ken Wyatt was the successful candidate at the time against James Martin, but they both supported the community vision.”
Ms Cook was able to secure $375,000 in federal funding and deliver a pump track and revitalise the Darlington Village centre.
“I’ve worked with politicians from all parties, and I must say I’ve never met a politician whose heart wasn’t in the right place.
“I’m not the combative type, I’m the collaborative type and that’s always worked very well.
“I always say to the community my superpower is really getting the right people in.
“I don’t actually have those (expert) skills, but I know how to explain and communicate with people and get them on board.”
Ms Cook said her family and work history gave her reason to speak up for the vulnerable and also noted the nursing connection between her and Vivian Bullwinkel, whom the new seat is named after.
“My father, as a youth, was quite an exploited worker and he worked with a lot of immigrants,” she said.
“He was abused, and we had a strong sense of justice and equality in the house, so he eventually became a union secretary.
“Not that I’ve had much association with unions myself, but I’ve got those values of speaking up for people that can’t speak themselves and I think that comes from being a nurse as well.
“As a nurse you advocate for patients when they’re at their most vulnerable.
“It’s been a natural progression for me, and I think the next federal level will be exactly the same.”
Ms Cook said she looked forward to bringing all the concerns she had learned about from the community, from telecommunications to housing, to a federal level.
“I love where I live, I love the shire, and when Bullwinkel opened up it was just such an opportunity,” she said.
“Some things we don’t have control over in local government, and that does frustrate me, so if I’m in federal government, I’ll have more of an opportunity to handle those issues.”
MIA Davies continues her push to earn the trust of residents in the newly proposed federal seat of Bullwinkel and met with the Shire of Mundaring this week to discuss community priorities.
Ms Davies and Nationals Infrastructure and Transport and Regional Development spokesperson Senator Bridget McKenzie met with Echo News on Monday and spoke about the concerns they anticipated from Mundaring council and residents.
“I’m here to understand how we can get people moving as quickly and as safely around this community as possible and we’ve heard today from communities in the hills about the need for road infrastructure to make sure that that’s a safer trip up and down the mountain,” Ms McKenzie said.
“Also, telecommunications are a significant issue.
“Rolling out telecommunications infrastructure to communities, (is) something that we’ll be having more focus on.”
Ms Davies said telecommunications also fed into bushfire management concerns which remained a priority for hills residents.
“Really simple infrastructure stuff like battery backups and having that capacity in the aftermath of an emergency so people can be reconnected,” she said.
“I see that right across my current electorate — certainly, an issue that will be raised again and again.
“We just need to see some funding going in to make sure that the resilience is built into the system, and it also impacts businesses.
“If you’ve got gaps in the system, so mobile black spots, you’ve got businesses that can’t operate efficiently let alone the safety aspect.”
A Shire of Mundaring spokesperson confirmed The Nationals members met with Shire President Paige McNeil and chief executive officer Jason Whiteaker and spoke about the expected issues.
“The meeting covered a range of topics, which are featured in the council’s advocacy strategy with a particular focus on telecommunication resilience in the Perth Hills, potential funding opportunities for the Mundaring town centre and cultural hub project, Brown Park precinct redevelopment as well as the commitment from the shire of providing universally accessible public facilities, with a particular focus on female accessible changerooms,” they said.
“The shire president, and council, will continue to advocate for the projects and priority areas with all candidates.”
Ms Davies recognised the fresh challenge of representing the hills compared to the regions but said there were more similarities than differences.
“I know the National Party hasn’t presented itself here in the hills and down in the foothills traditionally,” she said.
“But my experience is that the issues we’re talking about: telecommunications, bushfire preparedness, housing pressures, cost of living, the ability to work or retire close to the community you love — they’re all issues that resonate and are very close to my heart as someone that’s represented the broader regional community in the hinterland.
“So, my job is to come and listen and find out what the aspiration of that community is and then fight like anything to get it over the line, and we’ve got a history of doing that.”
“Because of our smaller population centres here, because we are so remote, and I’m talking remote from Canberra, when they make decisions, they make them for Bendigo, Ballarat, Sydney and Melbourne.
“They don’t make them for Western Australia, and I’ve banged my head against a brick wall for so long, I’m actually going to go to Canberra and try and have a go at it at the end where the decisions are made — and that to me is important.”
When asked how she will ensure that commonsense approach isn’t lost from being so far from home, Ms Davies said connection to community was key.
“If you remain in your community, connected to it, then whatever happens in Canberra, you always got to come back and be able to be accountable,” she said.
“The accountability, particularly in the electorate that I hold now, they hold you to a very high regard.
“They don’t necessarily expect you to win every fight, but they expect you to have the fight and be in the ring.
“Stay true to the values that actually got you to where you are today: family, your team, being part of a community — that’s what grounds you.
“I think for me they’ve always been the most important things in my career no matter where I’ve been and no matter what role I’ve held, and that’s not going to change.”
